Soccer Picks: Tottenham Hotspurs vs. Aston Villa

Monday, November 21, 2011 1:47 PM ET

The Tottenham Spurs plan on taking all three points against Aston Villa as a Get Well Soon message to boss Harry Redknapp. Lets recap the latest soccer betting odds on offer today and decide if we need to change our initial soccer picks.

I have already previewed tonight's matchup in a previous article, but as kickoff nears, lets check out the latest offerings from the bookies and decide where we are going to lay our money.

Form
favours the home side

The Tottenham Spurs are on an unbeaten run that has clocked up 22 points (from a possible 24) that
sees them on the cusp of a top four finish and the coveted Champions League spot. As for Villa; they are winless in
their last five Premier League away matches, a run dating back to May. Last season both meetings between
these sides ended 2-1 to Spurs, with the same goalscorers each time. That man; Rafael
van der Vaart scored all of Spurs goals (sportsbooks have him at 9/2 to open the scoring on
Monday night) and Marc Albrighton netted Villa's goal each time (he’s at 14/1
to score first).

The table
doesn't lie

Chelsea
losing yesterday means that Spurs can overtake their London rivals with just a
draw as the Blues are only ahead of Spurs by goal difference. What's more, if
Tottenham win by a two goal margin they will rocket up to third in the league
as Newcastle are now just three points and one goal ahead of Spurs.

Tottenham
might also be looking over their shoulder as wins for Arsenal and Liverpool at
the weekend mean they are tied on points (22) with both of those clubs. Having
games in hand is all well and good, and Spurs have two of them on both sides,
but points on the board is what really matters.

It's worth mentioning that if
Villa stuffs the Spurs by two goals or more, Tottenham can actually start sliding
down the table on goal difference. Villa are steady as they go in the table as
they would have to be beaten by 10 goals to drop down the table and regardless
of the score a win couldn't improve their position as they are seven points
behind Arsenal who are directly above them.

Bet
on goals!

I wouldn't
recommend backing it but you can get soccer odds of 17/1 on this game ending 0-0. Villa have gone eight games without a no score
draw and four games without recording a clean sheet, while the Tottenham Hotspur
have gone 18 games without a 0-0. Bookies seem to feel confident that this game
will go Tottenham's way and they'll scored a pair of goals at least. 2-0 to
Spurs is at 5/1 and 2-1 is offered up at 7/1, I do feel that Spurs have more
than two goals in them and you might want to have a bet on 3-1 to the home side
at 10/1.

It
should be a great night’s entertainment, especially if you’re a Spurs fan and
as ‘arry himself said, "I'd rather be watching it from the bench than on
TV." Tottenham
are still 40/1 to win the league, but some soccer betting outlets still have Aston Villa way back at
300/1. I wouldn’t recommend backing either side to win the Premiership this
year but the odds tell you which team should do better tonight. The
simple odds have Tottenham as outright favourites at 1/2 to win the game, while
Villa are a lot less likely at 11/2.

Prediction: I’m sticking to my original soccer pick; 3-0 to Spurs (now at a
lower 9/1).